Latest celeb nude pictures likely to come from original hacks

Just when celebrities thought they were safe, a latest round of naked and risqué pictures have flooded the internet, most notably through 4Chan and Reddit again.

Stars Rhianna, Kim Kardashian, Avril Lavigne and Vanessa Hudgens are among those that have had candid photographs leaked onto the net. Previously, Hunger Games and American Hustle star Jennifer Lawrence was the major victim in the picture hacking scandal.

However, experts are keen to advise that they don't think the latest wave of images are related to new hacking exploits. Instead, it is likely that they were taken either in the previous thefts, or even before that.

Technology TV presenter David McClelland said on ITV's Good Morning Britain today that they are likely to have come from the original attacks. "They have be trading them for other pictures or even money," he said.

He was referring to industry gossip that suggests that a larger group of hackers have been secretly downloading and hoarding nude images of celebrities gleaned from cloud services for a while, swapping them in a clandestine nature amongst themselves.

Tim Cook had posted an open letter about Apple's privacy policy after the previous hacks were partly blamed at iCloud, citing that iOS 8 encrypts users' information. But it the latest leaks are not believed to come from a further breach.

After the J-Law pics were distributed, it seems the group has decided to share all.

That said, there are still steps that you and targeted celebrities can take to ensure that private photos remain just that.

The latest pictures have been taken down from many of the social networks. Perhaps this is the end to it now?